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AbstractSince gaining independence in 1991, the Central Asian Republics (CARs) have faced various political challenges, including the existence of political Islam and Islamic extremism. This issue has had a slight impact on the entire region, albeit to different extents. Various perspectives have been proposed to elucidate why political Islam in this region has predominantly manifested as religious fundamentalism. Alternatively, the frustration-aggression hypothesis and Merton’s social strain theory provide illustrations of these approaches. Consistent with this concept, severe suppression and authoritarianism do not eliminate political dissent; instead, they can stimulate further disagreement and conflict. The study argues that the severe political suppression of both religious and secular opposition groups has caused them to withdraw from public view and has led to a rise in violence in the Central Asian Republics. This study employs a qualitative research method and a descriptive-analytical methodology to examine the correlation between political repression and the rise of Islamism in five countries in Central Asia. According to the results of the present study, it seems that governments in Central Asia prefer to understand political Islam in a manner that is too simplistic and characterised by a strict division into two opposing categories. Furthermore, they display a lack of acceptance of even moderate and liberal manifestations of Islamism. Inadvertently, this approach has facilitated the expansion of Islamic fundamentalism in CARs. The government in this region should develop new ways to allow conversations for future generations of moderate and secular Muslims to combat Islamic extremism.

This article explores the interplay between political thought and practice within Tunisia’s Ennahda party, first during its period in opposition, then after it took power in 2011, and finally in the aftermath of the 2021 coup. We trace the genealogy of political thought within the party from the point of its foundation. In doing so, we explore the gradual evolution of party ideology, from a da΄wa-based belief system between 1969 and 1981, to Islamic democracy between 1981 and 2011, to ‘Muslim democracy’ after the 2011 uprising. We examine this ideological evolution through the framework of three key elements: (i) Islam, (ii) Tunisia’s changing socio-political context, and (iii) the broader universal episteme. As we show, a significant turning point came in 2016, with the separation of the da΄wa from party politics, which revealed a burgeoning state/party conceptualization of politics. However, the 2021 coup challenged Ennahda’s concept of Muslim democracy, as well as all aspects of the party’s own sense of continuity as a significant socio-political actor, such as its institutional structure, leadership, membership, social base, political strategy, and ideology. Ennahda is now confronted by an authoritarian resurgence, which aims at containing the party, and at delegitimizing its participation within nation-state structures. Empirical evidence, based on content-analytical evaluations of personal interviews as well as the media’s coverage of Ennahda, shows that the party’s representatives are increasingly focusing on organizational reform in order to deal with the ramifications of the 2021 coup. Their aim seems to be to democratize both Ennahda and the Tunisian state itself.

A biographical study through the lens of Mills’ sociological imagination and Erikson’s identity crisis provides a unique understanding of Dr Fauzi AR, a dedicated Islamist. Fauzi grew up in a devout Muslim family in Kauman, Yogyakarta, the heartland of the modernist Islamic organisation Muhammadiyah. He was educated in Muhammadiyah schools and eventually became a qualified medical doctor. He was politically active in the Islamic United Development Party and joined Laskar Jihad, a Salafi-Wahabi paramilitary group, during the inter-religious conflict in Maluku in 2000. This article argues that the political turbulence during the democratic transition in 1998–1999 led Fauzi to have an identity crisis, which spurred his desire to participate in jihad (holy war). Afterwards, Fauzi became a reformed “maverick post-jihadist,” in that he was unpredictable yet competent. He was unorthodox in his methods, remaining active in mainstream political Islam through the United Development Party while also engaging in physical jihad, which is contradictory because participation in partisan politics is forbidden by the Salafi doctrine. He also remained a heavy smoker although smoking is forbidden by Salafi religious decree. He further defied Salafism by supporting his wife in an unsuccessful bid for a seat in the national parliament as a member of the secular-nationalist party Gerindra in the 2009 election. This case study of Fauzi AR reflects the complex and multifaceted nature of political Islam and Islamic movements in the post-Soeharto era, including those who resorted to extremism and violence to achieve greater Islamisation of society.

This exploratory, diachronic study compares the politics of Islamisation, which have undergone different patterns of development in both Nigeria and Malaysia. Islamisation is defined as an ideological translation of Islamism into policies to “Islamise” the state and society by expanding the scope of the application of Islamic laws and principles. Islamisation in Malaysia has been implemented steadily and progressively since the 1980s. It involves the “inculcation of Islamic values” in a wide range of aspects of society, including the economy. The Islamic penal code or hudud enactments were legislated in two states, but held in abeyance due to their unconstitutionality. In contrast, Nigeria observed the sudden and erratic implementation of hudud in 12 northern states in 1999, along with other bureaucratic adjustments. Adopting an interpretative case study approach of the comparative method of Arend Lijphart, we explain the two contrastive case studies of the ideological translation of Islamism by analysing the manner in which various political opportunities and structural constraints in the respective cases have shaped the Islamisation process. Data gathering was based on an extensive review of the related body of literature. Analysis was conducted using a social movement theoretical framework based on a structured, focused comparison. The dynamic conceptualisation of the state as a set of institutions, which is continually and dialectically reshaped by contentious processes, captures how the bureaucratisation and judicialisation of Islam have modified the nature of state structures and the structure of political opportunities, which in turn allows for additional channels of influence for Islamic activists.

The disbandment of Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia (HTI) in 2017 marked a significant shift in the dynamics of Islamist movements within Indonesia’s political landscape. Although officially banned, the HTI continued to operate in the shadows, employing various camouflage methods. This article analyzes how political dynamics led HTI to its outlawed status and how it adapted in pursuit of its goals amidst the challenges faced. By adopting a political opportunity structure and Islamist ideology as the theoretical framework with the case study as the method, this study scrutinizes HTI’s post-disbandment endeavors at the national level and delves deeper into cases in West Java, Yogyakarta, and East Java. The primary findings of this study reveal that the disbandment of HTI reflected the peak of incongruence between the anti-system ideology they embraced and Indonesia’s political structure. HTI’s ideological drive to exploit electoral events in 2016-2017 eventually put them at a threshold that the ruling authority perceives as a severe threat. HTI struggled to maintain its movement, mixing overt and covert operations, and facing significant pressures and constraints. Its strength is rooted in an Islamist ideology that integrates political and religious beliefs, supported by a disciplined structure. This resilience, seen as adaptive resistance, leverages tactical ingenuity and militancy in response to external pressures and the socio-cultural context in which they operate. Nevertheless, the disbandment has rendered it nearly impossible for HTI to reestablish its expansion in Indonesia’s political arena.

According to prevalent narratives, firstly, the Iranian revolution was the outcome of the dominance of the religious-traditional part of the society over the modern part. And secondly, it was the same religious-traditional section that took power and had their sway over the Iranian society after the victory of the revolution. This article wants to challenge both of these narratives. From this article’s perspective, the religious-traditional section of pre-revolutionary Iran itself can be divided into political and non-political parts. The discourse of “political Islam” was different from those of traditional and conservative ones which prevailed among large parts of the religion-oriented population of Iran. But the second and more important point is that even the pre-revolution discourse of political Islam did not remain the same, after the revolution and with the establishment of the Islamic Republic in the 1980s. It was found that during the post-revolutionary era, a new discourse was emerging as a result of the conjuncture of the event of war and “Imam Khomeini’s charisma”. This discourse shaped an ideology that gave legitimacy to the Islamic Republic in the sixties, inevitably demanded obedient and conservative subjects and could not remain the same discourse that nurtured rebellious revolutionary subjects prior to the revolution.

In the period of the formation of a new world order, it is extremely important to understand how the societies of certain states are separated from their governments. The concept of civilization expands its meaning and allows the unification of the societies of various states into a single civilizational form of self-determination. At the same time, social crisis factors that manifest themselves in one society are united within the framework of civilization, which forms mechanisms for their collective manipulation. Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine made it possible to understand the alignment of societies in world civilizations and to understand their internal “rules of the game”.

İngiliz ve Avustralyalı bir sosyolog olan Bryan S. Turner, bu eserinde, bilginin içeriden ve dışarıdan gelen farklı konumlarını inceleyerek İslam’ı anlamayı amaçlar. Dine akılcılık bağlamında yaklaşan Turner, İslam dini hakkındaki tartışmasını hukuk (şeriat) veya dogmatik teoloji olarak ifade ettiği inançlar bağlamında değil, bir ‘deneyim dünyası’ (life-world) olarak adlandırdığı dini pratiklerin günlük yaşamda nasıl somutlaştığı ve yaşam biçimlerini ve kültürel değerleri nasıl etkilediği bağlamında yapar. Turner, Siyasal İslam, şeriat, Oryantalizm ve İslamofobi gibi temel konuları, pragmatizm ve postmodernizm gibi modern felsefeyle yapılan tartışmalar aracılığıyla keşfeder. Bilim ve nesnellik gibi geleneksel kavramlara bazı postmodern ve pragmatist itirazlar geliştiren Turner, dışarıdakilerin daha nesnel olabileceğine ve bir dinin veya kültürün içeridekiler tarafından görmezden gelinen veya ihmal edilen yönlerini fark edebileceğine inanmanın da mümkün olabileceğini tartışır. İslam’ı, özellikle, siyasi çatışma tarihi üzerinden anlamaya çalışır. ‘Siyasal İslam’ tabirinin aşağılayıcı bir şekilde kullanıldığının farkında olan Turner, Taliban ya da El Kaide gibi grupların eylemlerinin istisna olduğunu vurgulayarak okuyucuya Müslüman siyasetinin ve toplumsallığının birçok çeşidi olduğunu hatırlatır. Turner, özellikle Edward Said’in Oryantalizm tezine ve İslamofobi’nin sarih ampirik gerçekliklerine karşı olumsuz tutum geliştirir. Turner, her ne kadar İslam’ı anlamayı amaçlasa da kitabın birçok yerinde Hıristiyanlar ve Müslümanlar arasında diyalog yoluyla ortaya çıkabilecek bir anlayışın imkânını da arar. İslam’ın dışından biri olan Turner’ın içeridekilerin dünyasını anlamaya çalıştığı bu kitap, günümüz Müslüman toplumlarının sosyal ve siyasi meseleleri üzerine çalışan akademisyenlere ve genel okuyuculara kapsamlı ve önemli bir tartışma sunar.

This article examines how Islam and Indonesia's constitution interact. It shows Islam's complicated relationship with politics. It intends to analyze and investigate how religious beliefs and values influence political discourse and decision-making in various circumstances. It is hoped to shed new light on this critical and often controversial topic and help us comprehend the forces that influence our world by exploring Islam in modern political debates and conversations. Therefore, this article discusses the challenges between religious freedom and democracy in Indonesia. It also presents a detailed and analytical examination of the complicated and multi-faceted question of the future of Islam and constitutionalism in Indonesia, a country with a rich history and diverse culture. The finding of this study shows that political Islam and constitutional ideas affect Indonesia's political and social situation. Then this article seeks to illuminate Indonesia's future difficulties, possibilities, and outcomes through critical study.

This article examines the religious mentality in the nineteenth century Middle with reference to Mahdi movement political dimensions in Sudan during the early eighties. The study is organized into four sections which cover, historical background of the 19th Century Sudan, the emergence of the Mahdism in 1881 in Sudan, the political aspects of the Mahdist movement in Sudan, and local opposition against the Mahdist movement. The study key findings showed that the Sudanese Mahdi, Mohammed Ahmad, had been affected by number of factors shaping his religious mentality embodied in the idea of Mahdism. It was concluded that such mentality was evident in the political aspects the movement and local opposition. It was also revealed that those factors played such a vital role in the movement's prosperity that ordinary Sudanese people regarded Mohammed Ahmed, in sharp contrast to Mahdi-opposition loyal scholars (Ulama), as a savior capable of liberating Sudan from foreign rule.

The following article examines Islamic thought and changes in state structure in Indonesia since the reform era from 1998 to the present. The fundamental change of state order in Indonesia is marked by the amendment of the 1945 Constitution and the wide space open for the people to participate in the life of the country. In this situation, progressive Islam, mainstream Islam, and political Islamist thought emerged. The main problem in this article is how Islamic thought is transformed by three variants of Indonesian Muslims in changing state order in the reformation era of Indonesia. The basic theoretical framework that is used to explain Islamic thought and changes of state order above, in addition to using the people's approach as full citizens before the state, also uses a socio-historical approach, political economy. Then the analysis used in this article is political philosophy. The main sources used are the official publications and decisions of each figure and organization related to changes in state order during the reformation era in Indonesia from 1998 to the present. The results of the study can be concluded that three variants of Islamic thought in Indonesia that are very prominent in responding to and directing the changes in state order in Indonesia become a just and welfare state.

The article presents three significant developments in the global terrorism landscape: Far-right terrorism, the growth of al Qaeda, with Taliban patronage from Afghanistan, and the persistence of the Islamic State as the most dominant threat in the world despite the successive decapitation of its leadership The article notes the importance in this context of political Islam and the spread of "jihadist" doctrines both from the Gulf and from conflict zones supplanting traditional and local Islam. The article also notes the potential impact of the radical environmental movement and the growing problem of the use of violence by other radical groups.

Traditionally, Sufis, jurists, philosophers, and theologians, are known as different schools of Islamic thought, each of which has its own approach to Islamic education. However, from the 19th century onwards, another powerful approach emerged: political Islam, which also had a different conception of Islamic education. The present study tries to explain how the political conception of Islamic education was formulated in this approach. To achieve this goal, al-Afghani's ideas have been examined. Al-Afghani was one of the first Islamic theologians who formulated modern political Islam and called for accepting modern values because of their consonance with Islamic values. This article, interprets Al-Afghānī’s political theology as an emancipatory proclamation that aimed at the liberation of Muslims. His emancipatory attitude concentrated on the cultural reform; and the education of the nation was the core of this cultural reform. He believed that a general education system must be established that all people enjoy from childhood; and the core of the curriculum of this education should be based on political education with the theme of the greatness of the nation.

This article investigates debates about alcohol drinking in Turkey during the 1980s and 1990s. The emphasis is on the global body of knowledge used by the Green Crescent (Yeşilay Cemiyeti), a non-profit organisation that focuses on public health issues in Turkey. This organisation is the most active recipient of scientific facts and concepts provided by the World Health Organisation in Turkey, and it mediates this knowledge for the Turkish-speaking public. It translates reports and produces abridged versions in simpler language to communicate evidence about the harmful effects of drinking, smoking and other addictive substances. However, this translation has taken on a particular meaning in the context of Turkey. It has fostered specific notions about gender roles, nationhood and lifestyles based on conservative ideologies making use of Islamic principles. Yeşilay has played a significant role in connecting scientific knowledge about alcohol with Islamic understandings of morality and in mediating between international anti-alcohol organisations and local religious conservative groups. The study contributes to the understanding that contemporary public health programmes addressing addiction issues are shaped by ideological and religious elements as well as internal social and political dynamics.

The study focuses on a set of issues related to the assessment of key trends in the development of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), which has been raised in the research published by Russian academicians V.G. Baranovskii and V.V. Naumkin in 2018. The aim of this paper is to reexamine their estimates and forecasts in the light of recent developments and on this basis to take a fresh look at the future of the MENA region. To that end, the first section of the paper revisits the main findings of the 2018 research. It shows which of the global and regional trends outlined there have retained their relevance under modern conditions, and which ones need serious reappraisal. In particular, the authors note that the trend towards the universalization of regional political systems stemmed from their overall modernization is being increasingly counterbalanced by the revival of archaic socio-political practices. The recent developments in the region have had an even greater impact on the process of democratization and the globalization-regionalization dichotomy. The authors argue that these changes were not completely unforeseen; on the contrary, they were anticipated if one looks at them through the lens of neo-modernism. The second section analyzes current trends in regional development. It shows that though the most acute regional conflicts in the MENA region are gradually de-escalating, centrifugal tendencies are becoming more evident, as heterogeneity of political systems and regimes increases. In this context, the discourses of decolonization and neocolonialism, as well as symbolic politics in general, are gaining a whole new meaning.

Arab spring memberikan pengaruh signifikan terhadap keadaan sosial dan politik di Libya era Muammar Khadafi. Jumlah pengangguran meningkat dan kegiatan bisnis wiraswasta mengalami kesulitan sehingga berdampak terhadap gejolak politik di wilayah tersebut. Tujuan penelitian dalam artikel ini adalah untuk mendeskripsikan masa kedatangan Islam hingga Kemerdekaan di negara Libya, menganalisis gejolak politik era Muammar Khadafi hingga era Arab Spring. Prosedur metode penelitian sejarah memiliki empat tahapan, yaitu heuristik; kritik sumber atau verifikasi; interpretasi atau eksplanasi dan terakhir penulisan sejarah atau historiografi. Hasil penelitian dalam artikel ini, yaitu: Pertama, Negara Libya adalah negara bagian Afrika Utara dengan sistem berbasis Islam, wilayah ini sebelum kedatangan Islam pernah dikuasai oleh Kerajaan Byzantium (Kristen). Secara historis, penduduk Libya menganut mayoritas Islam. Selanjutnya, pada dinamika Politik Libya Pra Arab Spring telah mengantarkan sejarah baru dalam perpolitikan Libya. Sejeak Muammar Khadafi membentuk sistem politiknya sendiri dengan Dewan Komando Revolusi (militer) berperan penting dalam penyusunan kebijakan dan konstitusi negara. Setelah rezim Khadafi berakhir, dinamika politik di Libya membawa perubahan yang signifikan. Terakhir, krisis Politik di Libya memang terjadi secara penuh ketika Arab Spring terjadi Jazirah Arab dan masuk ke wilayah Libya sehingga menjadi negara mengalami kekacauan secara politik sehingga mempengaruhi distablisasi negara dan berakibat kepada kemerosotan sosial di negara tersebut. Muammar Khadafi dianggap dikator dan otoriter dalam kebijakan negaranya yang berdampak negatif terhadap sosial masyarakat Libya. Akibatnya masyarakat melakukan gejolak terhadap negara tersebut dengan menuntut agar Muammar Khadafi turun dari jabatannya. The Arab Spring had a significant impact on the social and political situation in Muammar Khadafi's Libya. The number of unemployed people increased and self-employed business activities experienced difficulties, which had an impact on political turmoil in the region. The research objectives in this article are to describe the arrival of Islam to Independence in the country of Libya, analyzing the political turmoil of the Muammar Khadafi era to the Arab Spring era. The historical research method procedure has four stages, namely heuristics; source criticism or verification; interpretation or explanation and finally historical writing or historiography. The results of the research in this article, namely: First, the State of Libya is a North African state with an Islamic-based system, this region before the arrival of Islam was once controlled by the Byzantine (Christian) Empire. Historically, the Libyan population adheres to the majority of Islam. Furthermore, the political dynamics of Libya before the Arab Spring has ushered in a new history in Libyan politics. Historically, Muammar Khadafi formed his own political system with the Revolutionary Command Council (military) playing an important role in drafting state policies and constitutions. After Khadafi's regime ended, the political dynamics in Libya brought significant changes. Finally, the political crisis in Libya did occur in full when the Arab Spring occurred in the Arabian Peninsula and entered the Libyan region so that the country experienced political chaos that affected the destabilization of the country and resulted in social decline in the country. Muammar Khadafi was considered a dictator and authoritarian in his state policies that negatively affected the social of Libyan society. As a result, the people made turmoil against the country by demanding that Muammar Khadafi step down from his position.

This article explores the idea of political Islam as a discursive tradition within the context of Iranian Kurdistan. It challenges the prevailing essentialist and universalist approaches commonly used in the analysis of political Islam, advocating for a more adaptable and comprehensive interpretation. By conceptualizing political Islam as a discursive tradition, this study sheds light on the complex interconnections, configurations, and historical contingencies influencing Islamist discourses and movements. The paper argues that political Islam should be examined in relation to other phenomena and discourses, acknowledging its dynamic nature within specific temporal and spatial contexts. Focusing on an influential yet underexplored Islamist discursive tradition in Iranian Kurdistan during the 1970s and 1980s, the research acknowledges the hybrid nature of Islamist discourses, drawing from diverse traditions to fulfill particular objectives. In particular, it explores the perspectives of Ahmad Moftizadeh, a Sunni Kurdish Islamist and the founder of the Maktab Quran (MQ). This study investigates Moftizadeh’s views on the Islamic government, positioning it within the framework of discursive tradition. It analyzes his core categories and inquiries within Islamist thought, notably emphasizing Moftizadeh’s alignment of the Islamic government with the Islamic tradition of the Shura, highlighting its central role in the Islamist discursive tradition.

The present article poses questions about the relationship between Allameh Tabatabaʾi’s political philosophy and Islamic revolution and answers them. The method of this article is using library resources and documents, and it uses them to answer the questions. The achievement of the article is that Allameh Tabatabaʾi was the theoretician and one of the founders of Islamic revolution and had a considerable presence in Iran’s political arena as a political activist. Allameh Tabatabaʾi was a thinker with socio-political commitment and responsibility, and would attempt to perform his human, moral, religious and seminary duties. He had also political activities in proportion to his own situation. The present article is an introduction to this issue, and this subject deserves to attract some broad studies and inquiries.

This article examines the idea of ustāḏiyyat al-ʿālam (mastership of the world), in the political thought of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). Ustāḏiyyat al-ʿālam was formulated by the movements’ founder, Ḥasan al-Bannā, as the ultimate goal of the MB, the last of a gradual seven-stage plan to Islamize the individual, the family, society, the government, and the state, and restore the caliphate. In an attempt to unpack this abstract concept, this article offers a contextualized reading of its use in the foundational tracts of the MB general guides, and in pertinent commentaries on some of these tracts. We point to an inherent ambiguity in the concept, which intertwines ideational and active elements of domination, ranging between the homiletical task of propagating Islam to the world and striving to rule the world. Within the MB, ustāḏiyyat al-ʿālam is found to serve alternately as a privileged status of the Islamic nation, a duty, a mechanism of power legitimation, and as a source of motivation in times of despair, while utilized in anti-MB campaigns to discredit the MB and curb its internationalization.

The article examines and analyzes the spread of Islamism or Political Islam movements in the Greater Mediterranean and their increasing influence on the socio-political situation in 2011-2021. The historical factors, which contributed to the emergence of the hearths of Islamic culture in the countries which entered the Arab Caliphate in the Greater Mediterranean parallel with the Antique centers of European civilization, are retrospectively exposed. The Islamist ideologues called the Ottoman Imperia the heir of the Arab Caliphate. The main doctrinal conceptions of Political Islam and its more influential movement Muslim Brotherhood (forbidden in Russia) are discovered. The factor of the Arab Spring, which considerably influenced the strengthening of the Islamist movements, as well as its continuation of the protests in the Arab countries in 2018-2021, is examined. The main attention is allotted to analyzing the actions of the Islamic movements in Tunisia, Egypt, Algeria, and in the Libyan and Syrian conflicts too. The influence of external actors, the most active of which was Turkey, is revealed. The author also analyzes the situation in the Arab-Muslim communities in the European Mediterranean on the example of France, where social-economic problems, aggravated by COVID-19, have contributed to the activation of radical Islamist elements. It is concluded that confronting the Islamist challenge is a complex and controversial task. Its solution depends on both forceful opposition to radical groups and an appropriate foreign policy. An important negative factor is the aggravation of socio-economic problems and crisis phenomena in the institutions of Western democracy, in response to which the ideologues of Islamism preach an alternative world order in the form of an Islamic state. At the moment the Western society and the countries which repeat its liberal model do not give a distinct response to this challenge.

A new actor in the European geopolitical space — an ethno-religious “parallel society”- is transforming the social and political fabric of Sweden. An institutionalised Muslim parallel society is emerging in vulnerable areas, such as marginalised immigrant districts of Swedish cities, through the efforts of Islamist political, social, and economic structures adhering to the religious and political doctrine of the Muslim Brotherhood (this organization is banned in the Russian Federation). Committed to maintaining the Muslim identity, these organisations seek gradual Islamisation of the Swedish population through ideological influence on immigrants with a Muslim background. These efforts thwart cultural assimilation attempts and hinder the implementation of Swedish integration policy. The lack of research into the peaceful Islamisation of Swedish society and the related problems of Islamophobia, anti-Muslim racism, and radicalisation of Muslim youth lends urgency to investigating the influence of Islamist organisations on the Swedish Muslim immigrant community. This study analyses the literature, sources, and statistics on the essential aspects of Swedish Islamisation to provide a holistic picture of the formation of an ethno-religious parallel society in Sweden. The findings help evaluate the effectiveness of the national policy on confronting parallel societies, as well as of measures to promote democratic values as the foundation of a united Swedish society.

The present study tries to answer this question: Why is the mausoleum of Imam Reza (a holy saint shrine) one of the most luxurious and expensive buildings in the world? By staying in Mashhad as a pilgrim, the researcher conducted 45 participatory and semi-structured interviews with pilgrims in two consecutive stages. For analysing the collected data, a qualitative research method was used based on Constructing Grounded Theory. The concept of ‘the politics of constructing spirituality’ as the core category referred to the fact that the main reasons for the luxury and magnificence of Imam Reza’s mausoleum in Iran, are as follows: the existence of political-religious discourse in Iran, trying to continue the process of political socialisation via pilgrimage, representation and induction of symbols of political spirituality, the bond between spiritual salvation, pilgrimage and political liberation.

This paper explores the question of what explains public opinion of women empowerment in the Middle East and North Africa. Muslim societies have often been accused of conservatism toward empowerment, stripping women of equal access to education and opportunities. However, many predominantly Muslim societies in the MENA region seem to be on the way to implement change to provide women with more rights. Prior research points to exposure to diversity as a contributor to the acceptance of a more egalitarian role of women in society. This article analyzes different mechanisms of the exposure hypothesis and whether they contribute to predicting positive public perceptions of women empowerment in the region. The empirical analyses rely on public opinion data collected by the Arab Barometer in 2018–19. The descriptive findings suggest attitudinal differences across countries, but also significant gender gaps and divergences across core explanatory factors found under the umbrella of the exposure hypothesis, such as diverse urban living, keeping religion a private matter, and connecting with the world via social media. These factors seem important to shift people's minds and to pave women's long way to liberalization.

Civil religion encompasses the implicit religious values of a nation manifested through public rituals, symbols, and ceremonies at significant locations and on special occasions. The emergence of new religious symbolisms reflects the evolving structure of religious authority. The Islamic Foundation Netherlands (Islamitische Stichting Nederland (ISN)), the largest mosque umbrella organization in the Netherlands, holds significant influence in shaping the religious beliefs and ethical standards of the Turkish–Dutch Muslim community. Furthermore, the ISN possesses the ability to construct and authenticate discourses that redefine the conceptualization of the ‘self’ and the ‘other.’ In early 2017, following increased criticism of sermons written by the Turkish Presidency of Religious Affairs (PRA/Diyanet) in the Netherlands, the ISN, as the Dutch branch of Diyanet, started composing its own Friday sermons in both Turkish and Dutch. This article aims to examine the discursive features of the Friday sermons delivered between 1 January 2017 and 1 January 2023 and explore their connection to civil religion. The study employs Fairclough’s three-dimensional critical discourse analysis (CDA) framework and Wodak’s discourse–historical approach (DHA) to analyze the Friday sermons. The findings reveal that the civil religious discourses advanced by the ISN possess both unifying and divisive potential. However, the collected empirical evidence suggests that state-sponsored civil religion, emphasizing Turkish nationalism and Islamism, dominates the liberal and pluralistic form of civil religion.

The exploration of the quiddity of political Islam and the diverse range of categories and terms associated with it has emerged as a prominent research agenda within the social and political sciences. The application of these terms to a wide array of heterogeneous phenomena and currents among Muslim populations worldwide, coupled with the utilization of multiple theoretical approaches to define and formulate them within the realm of social studies, has posed significant challenges to their usage. The inherent ambiguity and lack of determinacy surrounding the dominant categories and definitions prevalent in the study of political Islam have led to a decline in their explanatory capacity, giving rise to a host of theoretical, methodological, normative, and political dilemmas and predicaments. This problematic state, compounded by the extensive body of research in the field of political Islam, necessitates an epistemological interrogation into the prevailing categories and definitions within this scholarly domain. Through a critical examination of prevailing definitions within the field, particularly in relation to the idea of foundation, the present article draws on the post-foundationalist approach to propose a distinctive conceptual apparatus for understanding and interpreting the phenomena categorized under political Islam. By juxtaposing the notions of discursive tradition and social configuration, the article endeavors to construct a nuanced understanding of political Islam that not only incorporates and comprehends the singular characteristics of the objects of inquiry but also encompasses varying levels of universality in elucidating the social phenomena observed among Muslims and in the Islamic world.

As Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono won the 2004 presidential election, it marked the end of Indonesia’s democratic transition era and experienced a dynamic change in foreign policy. The new international identity that viewed Islam as an asset was introduced by SBY, emphasizing the importance of moderate Islam as opposing extremism. The phenomenon of Islamic influence was not only the result of democratic consolidation domestically but also external factors such as the aftermath of 9/11 that portrayed Muslims as potential terrorists. For this reason, Indonesian foreign policy attempted to diminish such misconceptions and tried to be a peacemaker or a mediator in Muslim-related issues globally. To contextualize the analysis, the study focuses on the influence of Islam in Indonesian foreign policy towards the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and Pakistan. The mutual aspirations on the Palestinian statehood shared by both the government and the Muslim elements in society could be found, while religious sentiments were noticeable, as shown by the Muslim groups. In contrast, the influence of Islam in Indonesia-Pakistan relations, especially regarding the Kashmir dispute, was absent due to the difference in views of the government and the Muslim groups and constraining factors, including Indonesia’s national interest priority.

Some clerics (ulama) in the Islamic world are of the view that practical politics is closely related to Islam, which regulates how an order of state is run. This view historically departs from Islamic constitutional jurisprudence texts that justify political Islam. Likewise, some Islamic boarding schools’ (pesantren) clerics, better known as kyai in Indonesia, are of the view that practical politics is not only a world affair but also an activity based on the application of Islamic legal principles in achieving public welfare. This study aims to determine the academic basis of pesantren ulama in making decisions to be active in practical politics in Indonesia. Using a qualitative approach through interviews, the results of this study indicate that the political decisions of pesantren ulama are strictly based on the perspective of political Islam and fiqh principles that justify the involvement of ulama in politics. Furthermore, the conclusion leads to three perspectives in political motivations for pesantren’s ulama: to gain power, to preach Islamic values, and to demonstrate the existence of ulama in modern state administration. Contribution: The contribution of the study is to describe the permissibility of politics as an alternative to preaching and to show the existence and ability of ulama in state administration.

The author analyzes the perception of radical Islam in the discourse of Indonesian Muslim liberalism, whose history and current state are among the little-studied problems in modern Russian Indonesian studies. The primary sources are the materials of the tirto. id project, the main Internet resource of contemporary Muslim liberals in Indonesia. The study of the perception of radical Islam in the modern liberal intellectual discourse of the Indonesian Ummah and society is relevant because the country demonstrates the growth of radical Islam and Islamization of the society in general. The fragmentation of the Ummah also makes it relevant to study the current trends in its development. The article highlights the main features of the ideology of liberal Islam in contexts of imagination, criticism and deconstruction of Islamic radicalism. It analyzes the problems of the intellectual agenda of Muslim liberals, the peculiarities of their perception of the history and modernity of radical Indonesian Islam as a factor in the development of the Ummah and as a participant in the social and political processes of modern Indonesia. As a result, the following conclusions are drawn: 1) modern Indonesian political Islam isfragmented and represented by both liberal and radical tendencies, 2) Islam in itsliberal version islooking for new forms of its own structuralself-organization and representation in Indonesian society through its opposition to radical Islam, 3) dividing linesin Indonesian Islam take place in the sphere of different perception of state development models within the framework of the secular or religious paradigm of the state, represented in the political imagination of Islam.

This article gives an historical and analytical account of post-1967 Islamist intellectual production in the Arab-Muslim world and the ways it shaped political ideology in the region. By discussing Islamist approaches and debates with regards to the “secular” and secularism in the Arab-Muslim world the paper tries to answer mainly two research questions: what the perceptions over secularism were after the 1967 Naksa, and how intellectual transformations were applied on political identities, ideologies and strategies by some Islamist parties, occasionally leading to cross-ideological synergies. Using conceptual history, we divide post-1967 into two broad periods, while we argue that Islamist thought copiously appropriated notions of the secular with, however, many limitations.

From March 30 to April 12, 2021, members of the French Senate considered the government-prepared draft law on «countering separatism». His ideology is primarily aimed at curbing the increased activity of supporters of «political Islam» (Islamism) in France. Earlier, on February 16, 2021, the National Assembly (lower house of parliament) had approved the document. As shown in the first part of the article, the discussion of the draft deepened the split in the Muslim community of France between followers of moderate Islam, who supported the efforts of the government, and Islamists, who rejected the main provisions of the document. This article attempts to analyze a new stage of relations between the state and the Muslim community of the country – against the background of the decisions made by the senators. Accusing the French government of «Islamophobia»”, Islamic radicals appeal to the leadership of the European Union. Behind them, the figure of the Turkish President R.T. Erdogan, who is increasingly using religious rows in Europe for his own political purposes. The author of the article comes to the conclusion that the escalating confrontation in the Muslim environment and around it is acquiring more and more obvious political implications in France.

The Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (AKP) which has a tendency towards Islam, but secular concurrently raises a question: what is the identity of the AKP? To date, this question is still being debated although generally, AKP has frequently been denoted as a party with an Islamic aspiration. Hence, this paper aims to revisit the identity of the AKP based on the framework of Islamic political movement. This paper fully adopted library research by examining sources related to the scope of the discussion. Ideologically, AKP makes conservative democracy as its ideology by harmonizing between conservative and liberal democratic values. The party also adheres to the secularism discourse although it meets almost all the characteristics of Islamic political movement for the Turkish context. Besides, it was found that the AKP has sided to religious interests in few issues. At the same time, AKP also has been resisted by military as the guardian of secular principle. This paper argues that the AKP is a party of its own identity, where it upholds the liberal version of secularism and tends to create an accommodative atmosphere for free religious practice. Finally, this paper offers some recommendations that can be considered for future studies.

In a post-industrial society, radical Islam has undergone significant evolutionary changes, that contributed to its transformation from a religious ideology to a political one. The key element of the updated doctrine was the idea of creating a world Islamic state - caliphate - through global jihad. This article explores a new stage in the history of the phenomenon of Islamic radicalism, which has developed outside the Muslim world, where it has acquired features of a specific subculture. Global jihad is gaining popularity among young Muslims in Europe, the US, and Southeast Asia. A variety of cultural manifestations of Islamism, united by the term jihadi-cool, form an attractive image of a Salafist-jihadists through a special manner of clothing, new types of music (jihad rap and jihad rock), etc. Members of this subculture tend to join terrorist organizations, spread radical ideas among young people and attract new supporters. One of the most important causes of the radicalization of Muslims in Europe and the Americas is considered to be the complex socio-economic and cultural preconditions created by Western policies towards the States of the Middle East and the local Muslim diaspora. As part of the research, a historical-genetic analysis of the evolutionary transformations of Islamic radicalism has been conducted. The statistical method has been used to track the number of terrorist acts in the EU and the USA. Content analysis has been applied in the article in order to examine lyrics of jihad-rap musical compositions. The interdependence of jihad-rap popularity and the general interest in the ideology of jihad has been assessed based on the analysis of statistics of search queries. Biographical methods have been used to study the relationship between belonging to a jihadist subculture and joining radical Islamic organizations. The results of the study demonstrate, first of all, the high adaptability of Islamic radicalism to the changing conditions of the global world. Secondly, they indicate the specific evolution of a phenomenon that gradually overcomes sectarian differences. And third, they note increasing prevalence of this destructive doctrine in Europe, USA, South and Southeast Asia. All the results confirm that Islamic radicalism is not a local phenomenon, but a real threat to global political stability.

After the 1998 reformation era, PKB becomes one of the parties that gained a good reputation. Interestingly, unlike NU in the 1940s to 1970s, when it actively took a part in electoral politics by carrying out the agenda of formalizing Islam, PKB sought to synthesize the value of Islam and Indonesia in the context of a pluralistic state and pay attention to secular issues such as political education. In Probolinggo, the issue of political education became one of the post-reform political issues. This paper aims to formulate political education as designed in PKB's political program, as well as the changing of the political Islam articulation after the reformation. To get accurate data and results, a political sociology approach was used to understand political education within the PKB platform, and to measure the extent to which the ideational formulation is capable of being implemented at the practical and local levels in Probolinggo. The data obtained were analyzed in three contexts; the context of social and political configuration in Probolinggo, the context of political transformation in NU, and the context of the articulation change of post-reform political Islam. The results concluded that PKB political education in Probolinggo faced several constraints, both structural and non-structural, while the relevance was to provide contextualization of the reformation at the national level, marking a shift in NU's political paradigm, as well as the transformation of post-New Order political Islam.

Since the beginning of the twentieth century, modernist Islamic reformers have proposed more “objectives of Islamic law” or maqāṣid al-sharī‘ah and argued that the maqāṣid-oriented approach indicates that Islamic priorities include the modern principles of democracy, social justice, human rights, and government accountability. This paper considers the evolution of maqāṣid and its relationship with the traditional framework of uṣūl al-fiqh. Subsequently, it addresses how the new maqāṣid discourse has been politicized. It analyzes the use of maqāṣid by Shaykh ‘Abdullah Bin Bayyah in his recent declarations concerning the UAE’s policies against regional democracy. This paper argues that Bin Bayyah’s interpretation of maṣlaḥah (legal benefit) and his adoption of the idea of absolute obedience to the ruler (walī al-amr) are not based on the traditional interpretation of the sacred texts that have been adopted by Salafists and Traditionalists. Rather, it is deeply rooted in the maqāṣid discourse and rational reasoning related to Islamic modernism. The article includes a comprehensive examination of Bin Bayyah’s justifications, as based on two basic points: first, the priority of peace as a higher objective (maqṣid) of sharī‘ah than rights and justice; second, the verification of the ratio legis (taḥqīq al-manāṭ). This paper argues that this ideological interpretation could shift the purpose-0riented basis of maqāṣid al-sharī‘ah to result-oriented objectives, which focus on specific ideologies to satisfy contradicting political ends.

Painful transformational processes taking place in the Middle East after the Arab Awakening pose not only new threats and challenges for regional actors, but also provide new opportunities for some of them to pursue their geopolitical ambitions and strengthen strategic positions, including through non-traditional methods and tools. In this regard, Turkey’s attempts to capitalize on the interest of some governments, which came to power on a wave of dissent, to learn from the Turkish experience in state building deserve independent consideration. These attempts were reflected in the concept of the so called Turkish model. In the early 2010s a particular interest in implementation of the Turkish model was shown by Egypt. The paper examines both the driving forces behind M. Mursi’s government special attention to Ankara’s example and the reasons that ultimately have led to the failure to operationalize the Turkish model in Egypt and the subsequent dramatic deterioration of bilateral relations. The first section of the paper identifies the key elements of the Turkish model. The author emphasizes that initially this model was aimed at identifying the optimal balance between religious and secular principles in public life. The second section explores M. Mursi’s government attempts to implement the Turkish model in Egypt in the first half of 2010s. The author shows that it was economic and political success of Turkey in the 1990s and 2000s including its rapid economic growth and the increase of foreign investments, as well as a successful inclusion of political Islam in the Western-style democratic institutions that primarily attracted the new Egyptian government. However, the author concludes that M. Mursi’s government failure to undertake profound economic, social and political reforms combined with a mixed attitude of the Muslim Brotherhood towards the Turkish model, growing popular discontent and a negative attitude of certain regional actors towards this proclaimed political course of the new Egyptian leaders have eventually led to the military coup and cessation of all attempts to learn from the Turkish experience. The third section outlines implications of the 2013 military coup in Egypt for the bilateral relations. The author concludes that the Egyptian case clearly demonstrates the limits of applicability of the Turkish model in the Middle East countries, as well as limitations of Turkey’s regional ambitions.

Political Islam has become an important factor of the international politics nowadays. By the beginning of the 21st century Islamist political groups have turned to be a matter of concern not only of the Middle East main stakeholders, but also the European and American ones. This circumstance has been aggravated even more, considering the fact, that, being a former metropolis, Europe had come to be a kind of cradle for the spread of Islam. The proportion of the Islamic population has been growing here year by year. Moreover, the migration waves following the 2011 Arab spring provoked even more tough migration crisis and posed a complicated challenge to the European society expressed in conciliation of freedom of religion within its Muslim community along with the preserving European values of secular democracy. The Society of the Muslim Brotherhood has always been considered to be a leading Islamist force not only in Arabic world but in the West as well. Indeed, if in the Middle East they position themselves rather as a political force, even though with wide representation, in Europe the Society of the Muslim Brotherhood claims to be a representative of the Muslim population of the region as a whole. Taking into account the growing Islamic presence in the continent, a certain anxiety in the European society cannot but exist, concerning the risk of conscious Islamic expansion. In this circumstances the question, whether this process is really taking place as well as which role the Society of the Muslim Brotherhood plays in it, came to the fore. This article tries to answer this question, analysing the different stages of the group’s ideological transformation and its influence on the group’s activity in Europe. The author comes to the conclusion, that being a movement, that has undergone substantial ideological transformation, the Society of the Muslim Brotherhood has followed a similar scenario in Europe. Since the organisation itself has made a long way from a militant organisation with anti-Western discourse to a moderate movement, claiming to be democratically oriented and tolerant to the West, their European branch has transformed from a small Islamist group in temporary exile in the enemy camp, to the organisation, considering itself a representative of the European Muslim community, as well as accepting Europe as a motherland.

The article is devoted to the challenge of the modern constitutional system of Germany by Islamic organizations. Mass migration from Muslim countries and the formation of “parallel” Muslim communities led to the fact that it was in this environment that transnational Islamist organizations such as “Muslim Brotherhood” found their adherents and established their branches. The article analyzes the tactics of actions of the Muslim Brotherhood transnational Islamic organization and organizations affiliated with it in Germany. These organizations are considered as an active subject with their own civilizational project for the reconstruction of the world. Based on the materials studied by German intelligence agencies, conclusions are drawn on the creation of an extensive network of organizations controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood, while publicly denying any connection with this movement. The tactics of this organization is to use all the capabilities of the “legal” institutions of a democratic state for ideological propaganda and political representation.The strategy of the Muslim Brotherhood remains unchanged - through the gradual “peaceful” Islamization of European society, come to a radical political reorganization of Europe on the principles of political Islam.

The article examines the origins of political Islam in the Middle East and the terminological aspect of the problem. The stages of the formation of the Egyptian Islamic organization Muslim Brotherhood were clarified and its key ideological tenets were established. The political and socio-economic circumstances in which the organization was formed are outlined. Attention is drawn to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the military and economic presence in Egypt of the United Kingdom, which consolidated political Islamic parties. The process of transforming the Muslim Brotherhood from a "group of like-minded people" into a political party is considered. The political and legal ideas of the founder of the organization Hasan al-Banna are covered. which became the main strategy of the Muslim Brotherhood. The situation of the organization in the 30's and 40's was analyzed during the attempt of Nazi Germany to turn the Brothers into their own puppet. The article reveals the role in the organization of its ideologist Said Qutb. His main ideas and views, which formed the basis of the radical Muslim Brotherhood branch, are analyzed. The link between the radicalism of the organization and the ultra-conservative trend of Islam - "Salafism" - was noted. The connection of the Muslim Brotherhood with the Free Officers organization, which came to power in Egypt in 1952, has been disclosed. It was stated that the Brothers supported General Gamal Nasser in the struggle for power, which allowed them to take part in the parliamentary elections. It is stated that the Brothers' criticism of the policies of Gamal Nasser and Anwar Sadat on Israel led to a ban of the organization's activities in Egypt. It has been established that under the presidency of Hosni Mubarak, the "Brothers" tried to enter parliament in other parties. The place and role of the organization during the Egyptian Revolution of 2011, which led the Muslim Brotherhood to power, were examined. The main reasons for the failure of the organization are indicated.

In Morocco, as in Tunisia, the political integration of the two main Islamist parties has given rise to a project of «specialisation» aimed at introducing a distinction between partisan activities and associative and preaching activities. Starting from the trajectories of the Ennahdha party and the Moroccan PJD, this article proposes to highlight the differences in the «specialization» processes initiated by the two parties. This transformation is analysed here as referring to a separation between political activists and preachers. It underlines the complex relations between the PJD and the MUR, as well as between the militants of Ennahdha and the associative field in the light of the «specialisation». It also identifies the phenomenon of movement of members of different organisations between the political domain and the sphere of social and religious action. The analysis shows that in the two studied cases the «specialisation» does not lead to an effective separation between partisan action and social and preaching activity and does not eliminate the porosity of the limits between politics and religion.

The question of the correlation between Islam, political Islam and liberal democracy has so far been the most exposed topic in exploring the democratic capacity of political Islam and Islamic societies in general. What is particularly intriguing about the relationship between political Islam and liberal democracy is the fact of its westernized triviality that has received a pejorative tone in Islamic political circles. Simplified, the triviality of liberal democracy for the Islamic political campus implies imposing a model of democracy that cannot be fully compatible with the original Muslim notion of society and government. Hence, the following paper analyzes exactly the relations of political Islam to specific inherent categories of liberal democracy such as the rule of law, representative government, the separation of powers and secularism as diferenta specifica of liberal western democratic discourse. Through the methods of induction and deduction, the author will illustrate how appropriate tangent or divergence is illustrated and how this is reflected in the general ideological positioning of political Islam towards liberal democracy in Muslim countries through an axiological and praxeological perspective.

Tracing back political Islam to the French Campaign that invaded Egypt in 1798, the article argues that political Islam emerged and developed from within the folds of the modern nation state in Egypt. The article conceptualizes three historical phases: from 1805 to 1849, 1849 to 1879, and 1879 to the mid-1920s. Each of these phases is centered around a common theme that characterized the discourses, knowledge, and structures of politics, the economy and “Islam”, as they encountered the West, which are, in order, technology, civilization, and ideology. The works of Ḥasan al-ʿAṭṭār will be explored as an example of the first phase, and the works of Rifāʿah al-Ṭahṭāwī will be the example of the second phase, where Islam, as it encounters politics, becomes the foundation of state nationalism. The third phase will start with a transitional period of undifferentiated discourses, but will quickly, after the British occupation in 1882, differentiate into three political Islams: liberal, represented by Muḥammad ʿAbduh and al-Ummah Party; official, represented by ʿAlī Yūsuf and the Reform on the Constitutional Principles Party; and extra-state, radical Islamism, represented by ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Jāwiš, and the Nationalist Party. The article will explain the national and international political and economic contexts that surrounded and participated in the formations of political Islam in all its varieties. Against the popular academic conviction of rooting Ḥasan al-Bannā’s thought in Muḥammad ʿAbduh’s work, and rooting ʿAbduh in Jamāl al-Afghānī’s movement, this article will explain the rupture and contradictions between Afghānī and ʿAbduh, on the one hand, and the rooting of al-Bannā’s ideology in ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Jāwīš’s thought, on the other hand.

Muslim Brotherhood is listed as prohibited organization in a number of countries, including Russia. Nevertheless, in different periods and in different countries of the MENA region it turned out to be well represented in the legal political field. The temporary failures of this largest branch of political Islam of a radical nature have not yet led to a fatal loss of the organization in the competition between different Islamic groups, or to defeat as a result of repression. The author explores the problem of such stability of an extremist organization for many decades. He defends the hypothesis of its long­term strategic action planning along with the accepted tactics of waiting for a convenient moment for the realization of power ambitions. To analyze the strength of the social base, a variant of the deprivation theory is proposed, which was considered in detail in other works of the author. The historical origins of the organization are identified using published as well unpublished archival documents. A historical retrospective substantiates the assumption that a prototype of this structure used to be existed in Istanbul and Damascus back in the period immediately following the Young Turks revolution in the Ottoman Empire. The strongest external factor in the development of MB is emphasized. It is support throughout the history of the movement from forces outside the region, which have seen and continue to see the possibility for themselves of a tactical alliance with the Islamists of this direction to realize their own ideas and pursue their interests in the East.

In the article, the author uses the example of Islam to examine the interconfessional relations, developing in the Russian Federation in the context of return of religion and religious beliefs to public life (revival of religion). This process affects both institutional aspects (evolution of the state’s federal structure, political system, formation of civil society) and value aspects of religion, such as its influence on the political culture of society, ideology of federalism and change in the content of secularism of the state. J. Habermas’ theory of deliberative democracy, the concepts of post-secular society and federalism, as well as the civilizational approach are used as the methodological base of the research. The author justifies his conclusion about the necessity to ensure respect for religious values while preserving the secular nature of the Russian state as an asymmetric Federation.

This article analyses the use of religion in Indonesian elections. It fundamentally argues that religion has been utilized by both secular and religious politicians to boost their electoral gain. Focusing on national and local elections in the past five years of Indonesian politics, this study suggests that religion is a significant instrument in the electoral decision-making process, both from the perspective of voters and candidates. Much of the data in writing this article derive from my current research project funded by the Indonesian Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education. Other data come from leading survey institutes, particularly Lembaga Survey Indonesia (LSI), Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting (SMRC) and Indikator Politik Indonesia.

Communism and Shia political Islam in the Arab world do not share the same ideological assumptions ; however, they do bear family resemblances, due to their historical relationship – particularly in Iraq and Lebanon – which can be broken down to three time sequences. From the 1950s, communist parties are anchored in marginalized Shia communities : the revolutionary narrative of Marxism and class struggle echoes Shia messianism. In the aftermath of the 1979 Iranian revolution, the dynamic is reversed : the anti-imperialist and eschatological narrative coming from Teheran fascinates the Marxist lefts, and encourages conversions to political Islam. The third sequence opens in the nineties, with the end of the Cold War : since then, Arab communists have displayed a political use of Shiism, that is not religious. By supporting Teheran and the Lebanese Hezbollah, some Arab Marxist activists try to reactivate a neo-thirld-worldist political worldview. Nevertheless, as have the proponents of Shia political Islam, they have abandoned for the moment any revolutionary aspirations.

The Islamic Republic of Iran, as a new government, has complexities, and it is important to understand and understand these complexities and the relationship between "Jihadist political Islam" and "Republicanism". It is also important to gain this understanding in order to better understand the functioning of the Islamic Republic of Iran and to understand these complexities these principles must be recognized and their origin properly understood. Accordingly, the main purpose of this article is to understand the basic foundations of government in the Islamic Republic of Iran. This article analyzes the foundation of the government in the Islamic Republic based on the method of Laclau and Mouffe's discourse and examines it in the form of alternative discourse for other competing discourses. Accordingly, the central sign of the discourse of the Islamic Revolution is "Jihadist political Islam" which is manifested by the establishment of the Islamic Republic in the jurisprudence of the province. The government in the Islamic Republic of Iran has drawn a paradigm shift from all previous models. This was due to the development of the discourse following the Islamic Revolution and the centralization of the Velayat-e Faqih. Therefore, it should be borne in mind that the political system based on the jurisprudence of the jurisprudence is an alternative to all its earlier discourse patterns and those of its rival discourses.

The Caliphate is an important concept for Muslims, especially for those who have been experiencing turmoil, disorder and conflict in their lands, as it presents as a collective body that is to be governed with fairness, assuring safety and justice for all associated with it. Once again it has resurfaced as a hot topic, debated by Muslims and non-Muslims alike. The advent of the 21st century has seen the establishment of many varied initiatives, all in attempt to re-establish the concept of a caliphate, however many of these have been short-lived and have received little support. Gradually, with the declining influence of terrorist organisations, the debate has almost lost its significance. This was until more recently, when the political Islamists of Turkey reignited the discussion through their claims of leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan as the rightful caliph of Muslims, inviting all Muslims to give him their pledge of allegiance. Therefore, it becomes imperative to examine the institution of the caliphate, its relevance to Muslims through identifying the nature of the caliphate and its theological and political values. More importantly, this paper aims to analyse the negative effects of the Justice and Development Party (the AKP) on Muslims, in Turkey and in other parts of the world, as a result of the party’s methods of conveying its extreme views through Islamic concepts and extremist religious interpretations. Political Islamists use primary Islamic sources and religious arguments to justify the declaration of caliphate.

In this study, we aim to analyse the position of cultural Islam in Northern European countries. To this end, we examine publications in major print media. Content analysis of relevant publications gives a detailed picture of narratives produced in mass consciousness as a reaction to the presence of Islam at the local and regional level and makes it possible to identify individual trends in the evaluation of such narratives in both scientific and popular analytical literature. The growing secularization of Islamic communities in Northern Europe and changes in the value-driven behavioural algorithms of believers lead both to the polarization of Islam and changes in attitudes to Islam from outside the religion. Studies into the factors affecting the dynamics of this phenomenon have both theoretical and practical significance since they help to evaluate the most promising forms of cooperation within regional collaborations and national programmes for international partnership. The forces promoting the cultural Islam project position it as an antidote for political and radical Islam. At the same time, the main factor preventing the legitimation of cultural Islam across immigrant Moslem groups (or, more precisely, communities, i.e. associations of people originating from countries where Muslims predominate) is the relevant isolatedness of those groups and their commitment to the Ummah. The novelty of research into how Islam and culture interact within those groups is closely associated with the goal of establishing whether cultural Islam is viable as a phenomenon of collective consciousness and whether it meets the following requirements: 1) satisfying the essential need for preserving the tradition and 2) ensuring flexible adaptation to a foreign cultural context. Our analysis of the data obtained has led us to conclude that cultural Islam is gaining ground within immigrant communities and associations. This can be viewed as a practical contribution to studies into the dynamics and mechanisms of adaptation, acculturation, and, perhaps, integration of Muslims and corresponding social groups into the socio-cultural space of Northern European countries.

The phase of geo-political developments taking place in the Middle East as the aftermath of so called Arab Spring has entered the region into a new era of imbroglio transition. One of the peculiarities of the ME new era is the major event of emergence of the Islamic State proclaiming the re-establishment of a new Caliphate. Moreover, the restoration of Muslim Ummah as ever continuing discourse is not limited to IS. It has its crucial fundamental nostalgic origin in the Political philosophy of Islam, which wishes to form the Ummah under the doctrine of Caliphate system, which has long history since the emergence of Islam in the seventh century. What is remarkably important to pan-Islamists is that in their view the reconstruction of the Ummah is a reaction of political Islam to the Sykes-Picot agreement. This paper individuates itself by examining the socio-political manifestation of caliphate from perspective of Islamists struggling to restore the institution of Caliphate since its destruction in 1924.